Mitsui & Co. African Railway Solutions signed a contract of the Electric locomotives for South Africa which were manufactured by Toshiba Corporation.

Following the global increase in demand of mineral resources, South Africa has been actively increasing its freighting capacity in order to transport more minerals from the mine-fields to the seaports for exporting. The Class 19E Electric Locomotives are part of such initiative to ultimately increase the export capacity of South Africa.

The Class 19E Electric Locomotives offer an improved utilization rate resulting from their ability to operate directly on both 25kV AC and 3kV DC railway lines. Moreover, the Class 19E Electric Locomotives have secured improved reliability through engineered redundancy on its electrical systems to minimize malfunctions. Lastly, the Class 19E fleet is also an environmentally friendly system by being the first electric locomotives in South Africa to adapt the regenerative braking technology on the 25kV AC lines.